This article was written by The Zillennial Zine’s spring editorial intern Jeanny Sánchez Gómez. Find them on Instagram at @jeanny_sanchez. If you would like to share an article with The Zillennial, send us an email at thezillennialzine@gmail.com.
We have all been through a friendship breakup at some point. The volatile ones where you can’t help but think of all the good, the bad, and the ugly. Those are always the ones that come to the forefront when we think about the topic, but what about the silent ones? The dragged-out ones, that leave you in limbo. Nothing bad happened but it definitely feels weird and you can’t help but think about whether or not it is worth saving the fragmented relationship. Friendships are just as important as romantic relationships and when considering taking friendship breaks, it’s an emotional tangled web of emotions that shouldn’t be taken lightly. And much like in a romantic relationship, a lull in connection and communication that leads to nowhere gets you thinking, can friendships have breaks? Can it heal a friendship, or does it just prolong the inevitable breakup?
While hanging out with a new group of friends one night, I couldn’t help but remember this TikTok I stumbled across that had me spiraling about more friendships than I would’ve liked. As I got sucked into a rabbit hole of friendship breakups on TikTok most of the videos talked about growing apart and not feeling guilty about it. In hindsight it makes sense, and then you scroll to the next video and talk about actively choosing your friends and putting in the effort to maintain them.
Up to that point, I had accepted that yeah, maybe some of the friendships I held close to me weren’t as deep as they once were, but I just kept telling myself “Well we’re just getting older and things are changing” as a way to brush all the feelings away. But that same night, after I left the hangout out with people I was actively choosing to connect with, I felt warmer than I had in a long time and I couldn’t help but try to figure out what to do about the friendships that had changed.
The friendship as a whole, held a love that runs deep and for the most part still great. And those moments of greatness where that relationship feels just as it always did, make it easy to overlook all the ugliness being swept under the rug over the years. Individually, as we got older it became more and more clear that the differences that had once made us close were suddenly making us diverge paths. It’s a hard thing to reconcile no longer aligning with each other, but it’s also freeing.
Sure, big fights or outgrowing friends (usually) leads to a lot of individual growth, but in the midst of re-evaluating the friendships that shaped you as a person, it just leaves you reeling about all the things that could be worse, and how much better it once was. And through all this (over)thinking I found that there are a few ways to navigate the murky waters of a friendship break and how beneficial it can be.
Re-group
As I mentioned earlier, the whole reason I went into a downward spiral, was the TikTok but also the new friends I was making and how that unintentionally brought to the surface friendship problems I didn’t realize I was having. While the issues felt very internal, at the same time it was all important factors of who I felt as a person. Having made new friends where you no longer need to water down your personality around or struggle to find jokes they find funny, puts in perspective just how different your friendships can be. A layer of honesty you kept hiding until you couldnt. Fundamentally, there are a lot of things keeping you from connecting with your friends besides “growing apart” especially when you realize that those differences were just always lingering in the background. The rediscovered feeling of a wholesome friendship can be such a slap in the face when you’re (not) trying not to hold on to those relationships.
Re-assess
After hanging out with friends where I left feeling seen and happy. I sat with the differences and realized that despite all the deep stuff you can connect over, sometimes the surface level of a friendship can mean just as much. Similar hobbies, interests, and for me specifically it also meant my identity. As my partner and I had very similar experiences in feeling out of place with the straight friends we considered close, we branched out to make new connections within the queer community. It felt like we were both lacking a community of people who understood what it meant to be queer and how that changes the way we move through the world. It was a breath of fresh air, having that kind of understanding within these budding relationships.
Acceptance
That leads me to the last part. Coming to terms with where the friendship stands and what to do next is probably the hardest part. Thinking about past conversations about the friendship already feeling strained and promising to do better just for it to stay the same. Minimal communication with random memes no longer holds up to your standard of friendship and that is ok! With that lull, it’s easier to decide whether having a break in the friendship is worth keeping a relationship in the long term. Taking the time to sit with everything isn’t a bad thing, and having the space to come to terms with the people you have become is a good way to choose how to move forward when you feel stuck and confused.
The optimist in me hopes that a break works in strengthening the friendship in the long run. Maybe it doesn’t but it’s possibly a better alternative than just adding an additional grave in your friendship cemetery. These are relationships that are built on choice, love, and respect, and sometimes a break can you realize how much you may or may not want to choose that friendship.
Can friendships have breaks or is better to just let go? Tell us about your experience with fizzling friendships in the comments.
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